Safeguard a Bandicoot from Extinction

Spring monitoring at Woodlands Historic Park and Hamilton Community Parklands

Since our last monitoring events in autumn this year, we have been hoping for rain to help our grasslands come along. Thankfully, Hamilton Community Parklands has had some decent rain and the grasslands are in good condition. Unfortunately, Woodlands Historic Park had gone through a dry winter, as well as dry previous summer months. This meant monitoring still had to be done to see how our bandicoot population was fairing.

Woodlands Historic Park trapping took place during the month of October. Approximately 230 traps were set for four nights of surveying. This equates to 23 kilometres to be walked at first light every morning, all in less than four hours. A massive task. This is achieved by breaking the property into six teams to be able to process all the traps effectively. Zoos Victoria play a huge role in assisting the event by providing trained bandicoot handlers. Along with all the volunteers who help, the handlers enter the data gathered electronically, hand over processing gear, and clean and reset the traps.

Earlier in autumn we caught 45 bandicoots. The hope for this monitoring session was not to have the ant population decline during the dry period which would significantly affect their food supply. The good news is that a total of 50 bandicoots were processed. A positive increase from the previous season. 20 of these were cleanskins (never been caught before),32 male,18 female, and the females were carrying a total of 27 pouch young. This is exciting, as at our last event no pouch young were recorded.

The most positive outcome was that the bandicoots were in a healthy condition. The success of bandicoots breeding strongly depends on the quality of their habitat conditions. So, it was fantastic to see them healthy and having adapted so well to their current habitat. We are also very hopeful, that when the grassland habitat starts to restore itself, there should be an increase in their numbers. For now though they are doing well in this scenario. 

Hamilton's update will have to be in our next report, as they trap in mid-November. All the signs are looking good for a positive monitoring session. The habitat looks fantastic, so there is plenty of grass nesting sites and plenty of food for the bandicoots. In recent spotlighting events there have been great numbers recorded, of both adult and juvenile animals. Catching them however, is still a challenge.

Woodlands and Hamilton both have plenty of brush tail possums which get to the traps early, and they often set the traps off, getting caught in the process. But we are still hopeful to catch a good number of bandicoots to see how the population is progressing. During the winter there has also been plenty of upgrades done on the properties predator proof fence, weed control and habitat improvement.

So all in all, it has been a great start to the Spring monitoring season

Once again, great work everyone. Thanks for those involved from Conservation Volunteers Australia, Parks Victoria, and all the volunteers, along with the members of the Eastern Barred Bandicoot Recovery Team, who have all assisted in making this project possible.

Travis Scicchitano, Woodlands Project Officer

It’s been a year of challenges and positives in threatened species recovery at Woodlands Historic Park. The biggest challenge we currently face is the reduction in grasslands habitat at Woodlands, which has come from various fronts.  It has been a very dry year, especially in the last six months, where we’ve only had three decent rainfall events during that period.  This type of grassland is classified as summer growing, so without that extra rain the plants have stagnated.  On top of that, grazing pressure within the site has continued.  Without the rain the kangaroos, possums and rabbits have severely reduced the height of the grasses, which is the preferred nesting area of the bandicoot.

Ultimately this impacts the available habitat for bandicoots and causes a reduction in their numbers.  The Eastern Barred Bandicoot breeds to their conditions, only producing offspring when there is enough food and available nesting areas.  Thankfully we have plenty of food for the bandicoot, but without suitable grasslands, we have seen a population reduction.  This, however, is not seen as a negative as it shows they are naturally adapting to the environment.  On the positive side, during our last monitoring session the animals were all in good health and were caught from all areas across the entire site. As soon as we see an improvement in the habitat the bandicoots will react swiftly and increase their population.

To further assist with the health of the grasslands, our volunteers have been tackling a major weed onsite, the serrated tussock. This is an invasive grass species of significance in Victoria.  Our teams managed to spray over 100 hectares, which frees up space for the native grasses to grow.  They have also mapped and destroyed small rabbit warrens over the same area.  This mapping was then used to follow up with heavy machinery to destroy the larger warren systems, which has made a significant dent in the rabbit population.  Volunteers have also been busy continuing with our regular fence patrols and maintenance, revegetation, monitoring surveys, bait ball making and track maintenance.   

With the recent addition of Philip Island alongside our Woodlands and Hamilton locations, we are working for a common goal through the Eastern Barred Bandicoot Recovery Teams plans.  The goal is to have 2,500 bandicoots in total across all sites to secure genetic diversity for the species.  Currently we are half way towards our target with around 1,200 animals across all three sites.  There are more sites being constructed and we hope to achieve our goal by around 2020.  This will be a huge achievement as it will bring the bandicoot down from extinct in the wild to critically endangered. It doesn’t mean our job is done but achieves our first goal on this long road to recovery, and means we are heading in the right direction towards securing a future for the bandicoot.

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